Drover
Former Chicago sports reporter Jimmy Drover, fired for alleged gangland connections, is approached by mobster Tony Rolls to check out a betting pool that may be operating out of the Chicago Commodities Exchange and could threaten Rolls's own operation. The gangster arranges a poker game in which Drover fleeces Slim Dingo, the arch-enemy of Drover's lady-love, Nancy. Dingo retaliates by beating and raping Nancy, and stealing the money won from him. Nancy flees to Drover's Santa Cruz, Calif., home where his pal, bartender Black Kelly, nurses her back to health, while Drover looks for the mastermind behind the betting pool.
Readers also enjoyed
Bill Granger
Bill Granger, was a newspaperman turned novelist whose fiction alternated between international spy thrillers and police procedurals set on the gritty streets of Chicago.
Usually under his own name but sometimes under the pseudonym Joe Gash or Bill Griffiths, Mr. Granger wrote 25 novels, many of which evoked the rougher environs of Chicago and included colorful characters with names like Slim Dingo, Tony Rolls and Jesus X Mohammed.
Mr. Granger’s favorite, and perhaps best-known, book was “Public Murders” (1980), in which the city is in an uproar as a rapist-murderer strikes again and again. Public and political pressure exacts an emotional toll on the tough, foulmouthed detectives investigating the crimes. Public Murders won an Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America in 1981.
Drover
Drover consists of three books. The current recommended reading order for the series is provided below.
